Athletics is a group of sporting events that involves competitive running, jumping, throwing, and walking. The most common types of athletics competitions are track and field, road running, cross-country running, and racewalking.

The results of racing events are decided by finishing position (or time, where measured), while the jumps and throws are won by the athlete that achieves the highest or furthest measurement from a series of attempts. The simplicity of the competitions, and the lack of a need for expensive equipment, makes athletics one of the most common types of sports in the world. Athletics is mostly an individual sport, with the exception of relay races and competitions which combine athletes' performances for a team score, such as cross country.

Organized athletics are traced back to the Ancient Olympic Games from 776 BC. The rules and format of the modern events in athletics were defined in Western Europe and North America in the 19th and early 20th century, and were then spread to other parts of the world. Most modern top level meetings are held under the auspices of World Athletics, the global governing body for the sport of athletics, or its member continental and national federations. (Full article...)

A relay race is a racing competition where members of a team take turns completing parts of racecourse or performing a certain action.

This section is an excerpt from Relay race § Relays in athletics.[edit]

In athletics, the two standard relays are the 4 × 100 metres relay and the 4 × 400 metres relay. 4 × 200, 4 × 800, and 4 × 1500 m relays exist as well, but they are rarer. Mixed-gendered 4 × 400 metres relays were introduced at the 2017 IAAF World Relays, repeated at the 2018 Asian Games, the 2019 World Championships in Athletics and were added to the 2020 Summer Olympics. In addition, a 2 × 2 × 400 m and shuttle hurdles mixed relay races were introduced at the 2019 IAAF World Relays.

Traditionally, the 4 × 400 m relay finals are the last event of a track meet,^{[citation needed]} and is often met with a very enthusiastic crowd, especially if the last leg is a close race.^[A] It is hard to measure exact splits in a 4 × 400 (or a 4 × 100) relay. For example, if a team ran a 3-minute 4 × 400, it does not mean every runner on the team has to run a 45-second open 400, because a person starts accelerating before they have the baton, therefore allowing for slightly slower overall open 400 times. A 4 × 400 relay generally starts in lanes for the first leg, including the handoff. The second leg then proceeds to run in lanes for the first 100 metres, after which point the runners are allowed to break into the first lane on the backstretch, as long as they do not interfere with other runners. A race organizer then puts the third-leg runners into a line depending on the order in which they are running (with the first place closest to the inside). The faster teams pass first, while the slower teams have to slide in to the inside lanes as they come available.

According to the IAAF rules, world records in relays can only be set if all team members have the same nationality. Several superior marks were established by teams from a mixture of countries and were thus never ratified.

25 March:

• Irving Baxter, American jumper
• Christina Cahill, British middle-distance runner
• María Caridad Colón, Cuban javelin thrower
• Stacy Dragila, American pole vaulter
• Muriel Hurtis-Houairi, French sprinter
• Abdalaati Iguider, Moroccan middle-distance runner
• Carl Kaufmann, German sprinter
• Stefka Kostadinova, Bulgarian high jumper
• Gunnar Nielsen, Danish middle-distance runner
• Aleksandr Puchkov, Soviet hurdler
• Irina Stankina, Russian race walker
• Mitchell Watt, Australian long jumper

• ... that Amane Gobena is the first Ethiopian runner to win the Osaka Ladies Marathon?
• ... that Oprah Winfrey completed the America's Finest City Half Marathon in 1993, running under a pseudonym and accompanied by a bodyguard, a trainer, and a video crew?
• ... that Sharon Cherop fell over at the Toronto Waterfront Marathon but got back up and ran the fastest marathon ever by a woman in Canada?
• ... that Kenyan athlete Paul Malakwen Kosgei became the World Half Marathon Champion in 2002 despite having never competed in a half marathon before?
• ... that A. K. M. Miraj Uddin set a Pakistani national record in the pole vault by clearing 12 feet 2 inches (3.71 m) with a bamboo pole instead of a carbon-fiber pole?

Stamata Revithi (Greek: Σταμάτα Ρεβίθη; 1866 – after 1896) was a Greek woman who ran the 40-kilometre marathon during the 1896 Summer Olympics. The Games excluded women from competition, but Revithi insisted that she be allowed to run. Revithi ran one day after the men had completed the official race, and although she finished the marathon in approximately 5 hours and 30 minutes and found witnesses to sign their names and verify the running time, she was not allowed to enter the Panathinaiko Stadium at the end of the race. She intended to present her documentation to the Hellenic Olympic Committee in the hopes that they would recognize her achievement, but it is not known whether she did so. No known record survives of Revithi's life after her run.

According to contemporary sources, a second woman, "Melpomene", also ran the 1896 marathon race. There is debate among Olympic historians as to whether or not Revithi and Melpomene are the same person. (Full article...)

• ... that at the 2022 British Athletics Championships, Daryll Neita became the first woman since 2010 to win both the 100- and 200-metre events?
• ... that Marthe Yankurije, who dropped out of school during her fourth year of secondary school, competed at the 2020 Summer Olympics?
• ... that every competitor at the 2021 British Athletics Marathon and 20km Walk Trial received a commemorative bonsai tree?
• ... that German runner Alica Schmidt, who is running in the Women's 4 × 400 metres relay at the 2020 Summer Olympics, has won multiple European junior relay medals?
• ... that the men's 100 metres event at the 2023 British Athletics Championships was run in heavy rain?
• ... that in the 1932 baseball game in which pitcher Eddie Rommel won his last game, he pitched 17 innings in relief, an American League record?
• ... that for the first time this century, this year's British Athletics Championships were not broadcast on live television?
• ... that at the 2022 British Indoor Athletics Championships, Lorraine Ugen equalled the championship long jump record?

• WikiProject Athletics
• WikiProject Sports

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